1. Field of the Invention
Embodiments of the present invention generally relate to compression of high dynamic range image data and, more specifically, to compressing high dynamic range image data into a low dynamic range format for storage in a render target.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally high dynamic range image data is stored in a floating point format buffer. Conventionally low dynamic range image data is stored in a fixed point format buffer of fewer bits per pixel, and therefore the low dynamic range image data is stored in less memory than the high dynamic range image data. Reducing memory requirements may reduce system cost or permit more buffers to be stored in the same amount of memory. Less memory bandwidth is needed to access the low dynamic range image data compared with accessing the high dynamic range image data. Performance may be improved when low dynamic range image data is used and the system performance is memory bandwidth limited.
Accordingly, it is desirable to store high dynamic range image data in a format that requires less memory than conventional high dynamic range buffer.